The Hungarian National Gallery is heading into 2026 with a packed calendar that mixes blockbuster exhibitions, intimate tours, kids’ workshops, concerts, and even Italian-language walks through centuries of art. As the country’s largest public collection of Hungarian fine art, the museum showcases both permanent and temporary exhibitions, plus hands-on programs from toddlers to teens and creative camps through summer. This year’s star: a sweeping tribute to Lajos Tihanyi, marking 140 years since the avant-garde painter’s birth. All events take place in Budapest unless noted otherwise, with in-person and online access points throughout the month.
Lajos Tihanyi Takes Center Stage
Rebel forms, brave colors. The gallery celebrates Tihanyi’s 140th with a special career-spanning exhibition featuring his key paintings, graphics, and personal objects. After losing his hearing in childhood, Tihanyi forged a visual language from silence—self-taught, fiercely original, and central to The Eight (Nyolcak), he became one of the 20th century’s most distinctive Hungarian painters. Guided tours accompanied the opening on January 11, with further tours on January 17, 18, 23, 25, and 29, and a sign-language interpreted tour on January 25.
Toddler Magic: Snowflake Dance
Bundle up for Tipegők – Hópihe tánc (Snowflake Dance) on January 13 and January 27. This toddler-friendly session turns the gallery into a winter wonderland. Kids explore how the forest turns white, hunt for color in the snow, sing, tell stories, and whirl with snowflakes—mittens and warm boots highly recommended.
Kids Become Art Detectives
Színezd újra! (Recolor It!)—the monthly museum workshop for children—returns January 14, 21, and 28 with a playful detective twist. The gallery’s spaces hide mysterious stories, and young sleuths follow the trail of Tihanyi’s secrets. Expect close looking at dozens of works, hunting for hidden clues, then getting hands-on: crafting “forgeries,” building composite portraits, and experimenting with photo edits until the bigger picture snaps into focus.
Curators, Scholars, Writers: Deep Dives Into Tihanyi
On January 15, curator Mariann Gergely leads a special tour, revisiting how Tihanyi’s works were known mostly via black-and-white reproductions in Hungary until the 1970s and how his estate made a dramatic journey from Paris to the Hungarian National Gallery 55 years ago. Art historian Gergely Barki offers an unconventional guided walk on January 16, then returns January 24 for a lecture titled Two or None: Doublings and Hiatuses in Lajos Tihanyi’s Oeuvre, unpacking the gaps, repetitions, and turning points that shaped the painter’s trajectory.
Avant-Garde, Silence, and Seeing
Mama, nézd! – A csend beszél (Mom, Look! – Silence Speaks) on January 15 and January 29 spotlights how Tihanyi’s childhood illness and subsequent deafness didn’t block his path but sharpened it. The program asks how deprivation can become a superpower in art, and why Tihanyi’s visual voice still feels startlingly singular.
Italy Meets Hungary
Visita guidata in italiano on January 16 takes Italian speakers through the highlights of Hungarian art, from the Middle Ages to now, with a special focus on the 19th and 20th centuries. You might even find Dante between the frames—consider it a cross-European handshake on canvas.
Make It Abstract
Alkoss! – Absztrakt élményfestés (Create! – Abstract Experience Painting) on January 17 is a studio session that starts in the galleries and ends with your own abstract artwork. The inspiration board includes Sean Scully, Judit Reigl, and Simon Hantai—artists who built entire worlds from geometry, color play, and free-flowing brushwork. Tour first, then paint big.
Words Meet Stone
On January 17, writer and art historian Rita Halász leads a subjective tour titled Betonba hímezve (Embroidered in Concrete). Expect literary riffs, sharp observations, and an eye for the emotional texture of materials and forms—thinking as making, spoken out loud among the works.
Nudes at the Turn of the Century
Aktszobrok a századfordulóról (Nude Sculptures from the Turn of the Century) on January 18 is a guided tour through the renewed collection of late 19th–20th-century nude sculptures. The nude is among art’s oldest subjects, but representation shifts with each era’s ideals. This tour maps how the body’s image evolved—materials, poses, politics, all in one sweep.
Style Switch: New Year, New Look
Szellemi fitnesz – Új év, új stílus (Mental Fitness – New Year, New Style) on January 21 explores artists who shape-shifted across their careers: János Vaszary, József Rippl-Rónai, and Aurél Bernáth among them. After a gallery walk parsing how works from the same hand can look worlds apart depending on the period, participants try on one of Rippl-Rónai’s styles in the studio.
Culture Day From Home
Can’t make it in person? On January 22, the gallery hosts an online guided tour of the Tihanyi exhibition for Hungarian Culture Day. Settle in at home and stream your way through his colors, compositions, and milestones—no coat check needed.
Family Adventures, Face to Face
Kaland a Galériában – Különös arcok (Adventure in the Gallery – Unusual Faces) on January 24 offers age-tailored guided tours that lean into the power of portraiture and the allure of unusual faces: a 10:30–11:15 slot for ages 6–9 and 11:30–12:15 for ages 10–13. It’s a fresh way to read expressions, decode symbols, and meet the many personalities of the collection.
Accessibility Up Front
On January 25, the Tihanyi exhibition includes a guided tour with sign-language interpretation, reaffirming the gallery’s push to open its doors wider—fitting for an artist who turned silence into a speaking visual language.
From toddlers in snow boots to scholars tracing gaps in a painter’s legacy, the Hungarian National Gallery’s January 2026 lineup is a brisk, generous sweep through time, form, and fearless color—anchored by an anniversary that feels anything but quiet.
